"Juno, where am I?""Some sort of convergence array. According to my schematics, there are seven others just like it spread around the station's dish. The firing tube you were in is just one of sixty-four, all being directed into a single, massive beam. I can't even imagine what the Empire could do with this sort of power."

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The first Death Star's superlaser had eight tributary beams arranged in a circle around the concave dish. The second Death Star's superlaser had seven tributary beams arranged around the concave dish in an octagonal array encompassed by a circle, and an eighth beam in the middle. These beams would then combine to form the main superlaser by the usage of an invisible forcefield in the shape of a cone. The tributary beams were themselves composed of eight smaller beams, which converged in one of the eight Superlaser Convergence Chambers, totaling 64 beam tubes. At the absolute center of the concave dish superlaser were focusing lens that allowed for the superlaser to be intensified.

Originally, the Death Star's superlaser could only fire at planets and required hours to recharge the superlaser.[1] By the time the Death Star II was built, the superlaser was able to fire on large capital ships and required a much lower recharge time, a matter of minutes.[1] The power source of the laser were special power crystals that the 501st Legion took from Mygeeto on the orders of Darth Sidious. In addition, activation of the Death Star's superlaser was particularly costly to Imperial military, both in terms of finances as well as losing any potential strategic resources in a habitable or resource-rich planet, and thus various restrictions were put into place for the use of the superlaser: A full and current Imperial Intelligence report on a target is required before activating the superlaser; targeting even listed worlds without the explicit authorization of Imperial High Command and the Galactic Emperor is explicitly forbidden; and only personnel with oversector administrative rank and current firing codes provided by the Office of the Emperor were authorized with activating the superlaser.[2]

The first full-scale superlaser was installed in the first Death Star battlestation, becoming its primary weapon. However, it ran into technical difficulties during its development, resulting in the proposition and potential development of the Composite Beam Superlaser as an alternative in the event that the Concave Dish's technical difficulties were far too severe to allow for creation. This weapon had to be manually moved into position by a mechanical arm, and fired proton beams at the targeted planet to rupture the planet's core and render it uninhabitable. Eventually, the Concave Model was chosen for the final design for the superlaser weapon, beating out the Composite Beam Superlaser regular model while a weapons researcher oversaw development in Bevel Lemelisk's stead.[3] At some point during its development, there had been plans to incorporate the Superlaser on the equator of the battlestation.[4] In 2 BBY, Galen Marek traveled through one of the firing tubes in the superlaser dish during the Battle on Death Star I, causing structural damage in the process. During this time, the Imperials were also doing several test fires in minute intervals, causing Marek to hide from the superlaser when it was fired, and also killing several Imperials unlucky enough to get caught in the blasts during their search for Marek.[5]

One of the tributary beams travels through the beam tube on the Death Star

The full-scale superlaser was built in the first Death Star and was used six times—it was first used during a Rebel raid on the Death Star, when Rebel agent X2 used the yet-unfinished superlaser to destroy one of the escorting Star Destroyers, then it was fired once with four percent power to destroy the Fortressa, a Lucrehulk-class battleship under Rebel control, three shots were fired as a secret test shortly after, to destroy the prison planet Despayre, and another shot with full power to destroy Alderaan and demonstrate the Galactic Empire's strength. This immense power made the Death Star one of the most powerful weapons in the history of the galaxy. However, before it could fire a seventh time at the Rebel Alliancebase on Yavin 4, it was destroyed at the Battle of Yavin.